Will woodcrest prices drop when cloverton hits

[boondawg]

Just a quick question...does anyone think that the mac pros will drop in price when the clovertons come out, or will the 8-core just be another model on top of the current lineup. I am gettin a mac pro and I'm just wondering if I wait till the cloverton's come out, maybe i can get the 3.0 quad for the same price as the 2.66 today.

 

[Scarlet Fever]

the updated products will take place of the current products. Price drops or hikes aren't likely.

 

[phantasm10]

Shake the Magic 8 Ball

 

[daneoni]

Maybe from the refurb store

 

[frome]

It may have a slight price drop but not enough to warrant the amount of production or fun you will lose waiting...

 

[MacsAttack]

Just a quick question...does anyone think that the mac pros will drop in price when the clovertons come out, or will the 8-core just be another model on top of the current lineup. I am gettin a mac pro and I'm just wondering if I wait till the cloverton's come out, maybe i can get the 3.0 quad for the same price as the 2.66 today.

There is no guarentee that Apple will even use these chips in the Mac Pro at all (they really are more server-orientated and would be a better fit in XServes).

There is no guarentee that Apple will use these chips as soon as tey become available (see 101 posts on the topic of Mac Book Pro updates that have consistently not happened "next Tuesday")

In truth, unless you are working in a neich area such as high end video production you just are not going to be able to utilize all those cores (if Apple even sells a system that uses them).

I could see Apple using the Quad 2.66 in a single socket as the next revision Mac Pro (fewer conponents and lower price allows them to charge about the same and make more money per system), but Apple appears to like stability and does not introduce a new model every three months. i recon the current Mac Pro (at the current price) still has at least 4 months on the clock before any significant change is made.

In the first Gen Mac Pro we have had the greatest (potential) jump in performance we are going to see (thanks to G5 development stagnation). Anything after this is going to be small incrimental changes over time. Given that the Mac Pro has so far not exhibited any serious problems (there have been a a few score problems with individual machines - but that happen with eany system you could buy) I would say that if you are gettig a Mac Pro either do it now or wait until Leopard ships pre-installed on one - by which point I expect the next minor spec/price changes will be made (wild guess April - May).

So I would say either buy now or wait 6 months.

I picked up a Mac Pro a month ago. It is a great machine. It will still be a great machine in 6 months and I look forward to seeing what extra tricks Leopard will teatch it.

 

[dmw007]

I don't expect there to be a price drop, but I would be glad to be proven wrong.

 

[Laurindo]

My theory is, that they overpriced the 3.00 Mhz for being able to come down, maybe three hundreds or so, when Cloverton take its place at the top end.

 

[FocusAndEarnIt]

My theory is, that they overpriced the 3.00 Mhz for being able to come down, maybe three hundreds or so, when Cloverton take its place at the top end.

I highly doubt that when they are trying to beat the myth that Macs are more expensive.

 

[Laurindo]

I highly doubt that when they are trying to beat the myth that Macs are more expensive.

I was meaning, that they could possibly drop just the price of Woodcrest 3.00, nearer to 2.66, and then having Cloverton at reasonable price at the top end.

 

[Umbongo]

My theory is, that they overpriced the 3.00 Mhz for being able to come down, maybe three hundreds or so, when Cloverton take its place at the top end.

I wouldn't say it's overpriced, and doubt it will come down much if at all. It's more sites like newegg are pricing very close to what they probably pay from Intel, but use chip sales to lure people to the site to buy the other products, especially the ones the make a real killing on from small manufacturers. Apple and Dell are charging the same for upgrading to 3Ghz, and HP charge $900, alot more than the price difference in the chips. Though with those two going 2GHz will save you around $800.

It isn't just the chip cost that is factored in on workstations (and servers, HP charge $1250 for a 3Ghz chip), while newegg can make very little on selling processors and still make it a viable business choice, corporations with huge overheads can't. They don't need to either because unless you are going to sell your chips and buy two others and void your warranty it's still the most cost effective method other than building your own from scratch.

I'd expect a dual 2.66GHz Cloverton option at $1200, though I don't know how competative Apple intend to be with Dell and it would depend who priced first in that regard. Something else we could see is perhaps:

Dual Core 2.33Ghz -$400
Dual Core 2.66Ghz
Dual Core 3.00Ghz +$800
Quad Core 2.33Ghz +$800
Quad Core 2.66Ghz +$1200

It's probably financially workable for Apple and adds the lowend boost (causing competitors to move their prices around). I wouldn't cross my fingers though. Of course there are the issues with Apple not wanting to confuse people between lower speed quad core and higher speed chips (all while selling to professionals ), or not boosting speeds so soon after release (IIRC the 2.16Ghz upgrade to MBPs was in a similar time frame though).